


Ebony

by Sempiternal (IamFTHF)



Category: EXO
Genre: Alternate Universe - Dystopia, Alternate Universe - Robots & Androids, Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-29
Updated: 2017-07-29
Packaged: 2018-12-08 10:28:01
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,933
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11644641
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IamFTHF/pseuds/Sempiternal
Summary: When I opened my eyes, the first thing I saw was the smiling face of a man. His name was Jongin, and he told me that he’s been waiting for me.





	Ebony

**Author's Note:**

> Okay so this was a short story I made a year (???) ago as assignment for one class. It was originally ocs but I butchered it and made it gay. Enjoy.

> When I opened my eyes, the first thing I saw was the smiling face of a man. His name was Jongin, and he told me that he’s been waiting for me.

* * *

I asked him who I am and he answered, “You are D.O, and you are mine.” He told me that we are lovers, have been for a long time. When I told him that I remember no such thing, that I can’t even remember anything, he only said: “You will remember in time, trust me.”

  
Jongin’s a scientist, of the mechanical sort. He uses his brains to think, and his hands to build. He has built many things over the years— cars, machines, computers, even synthetic bionics. “A bright idea will retain as such, unless you do something about it,” he would always tell me whenever I ask him about what he was doing.  
Ever since I woke up, Jongin has been by my side. He showed me the ropes of living, how to re-learn everything that I had forgotten; from the meager things like holding a pen, standing up, and walking.  
  
He showed me pictures of myself before the accident. But as I stared at the photograph, I couldn’t help but notice the differences between the me before, and the me now. First, the man in the picture had light brown hair, color so light that the sun hitting the strands seemed to make a circle of halo on his head. His rosy cheeks made the freckles across his nose slightly more prominent. But most of all, the smile on his face seems real. He was shining. The smile on his face even more so.  
  
_He looked alive, unlike me._  
  
I compared myself to him one day. I clipped his picture on the side of the mirror in the bathroom, and stared at myself. The shapes of our face were similar, so were our eyes, nose, and lips. But, that’s where the similarities end.  
  
Whereas he had rosy cheeks, mine were pale. His smile looked real while mine looked forced…almost pained, as if my muscles were not supposed to contract and bend that way, as if I was not meant for smiling. However, the biggest contrast lied on my black hair. My eyes stared hard at the person reflected on the mirror in front of me, almost burning holes on the glass and on the paper clipped beside it.

It’s like you’re looking at two different people and at the same time, you’re not.  
  
I told Jongin about my observation as I sat beside him on the living room, my tone casual and curious; trying very hard to make it seem like it’s just a passing thought rather than a desperate inquiry. I recoiled when he slammed the book he was reading down the table and despite the shock I was feeling, I knew I overstepped my bounds and stepped a landmine. “You will never ask me that again, you will stop thinking about that. You are him, understand? And I love you. You should believe me, you should only listen to me,” he said as he held me by my shoulders. I didn’t know why he was angry; all I knew was that the expression on Jongin’s face at that moment was something I never want to see again. The look of absolute horror; and anger mixed with something desperate, the face of a man that failed to escape from his past. I didn’t like seeing it on Jongin’s face, it made him look like a different person, someone dangerous. **A madman.**

  
He seemed to calm down after a while, his shaking hands stopped gripping my shoulders and soon enough, soft yet calloused fingers traced their way up to my cheeks, brushing at the cold skin. Jongin’s shaky breathing evened and he pulled me close, looking at my face and smiling as he took my features in, and leaning in to plant a soft kiss on my forehead, whispering apologies for startling me and I nodded and hugged him back.  
  
But that smile remained inside my mind: _crooked and so painful_.

  
  
After that confrontation, I never tried to ask Jongin about the different things I found odd. I never asked him why I never needed to consume food, or why I didn’t sleep (rather, he tells me to close my eyes and I can feel my whole body shut down suddenly, thoughts and everything: gone). Why, when I touched my skin, instead of warmth, I only felt ice-like cold.  
  


* * *

  
There were more things that made me different from normal human beings like Jongin. Not having warm skin was one thing, but the monthly examinations I have to undergo were another. It always felt uncomfortable, whenever Jongin opened up the latch hidden on the nape of my neck. There’s this irritating itch as he rewired the cords on my neck, or on my arms and legs.

  
I let Jongin’s scientific mutterings soothe me during my monthly _operations_. During these operations, Jongin would fix me to make me feel better again. “It’s your maintenance, D.O. You need this so you could stay with me. You do want to stay with me, right?” And I would nod, because I _did_. I wanted to stay with Jongin, because he’s all I got.  
When I told him that, he got this peculiar look on his face, which looked pleasant but something told me that it’s no different from the scary expression he had had before.  
  
“Just remember that you are mine,” he said as he caressed my cold cheek. “You belong to me and no one else’s.”  
“Of course I am, Jongin. Yours. Forever.” I always answer, and he would smile and kiss my forehead.

 **Always.**  
  
Every time, Jongin would kiss my forehead and whisper to me how much he loved me, and every single time I felt like his words were not meant for me but for someone else.  
Then, I would feel my chest start to contract, something that a human would probably describe as pain but I’d brush it off and tell Jongin about it, and he’d tell me he’d fix it next month. He’d fix it every month but the contraction would come back every single time he’d tell me he loves me. After the tenth time, I did not bother to tell Jongin about it.

I found Jongin alone inside his room that day, his body bowed lowly as he bends over a box, and when I walked closer, I heard him murmuring to himself: “I will give you your life back, Kyungsoo. I swore to you that I would,” he kept on repeating those sentences, uttering them to himself like a mantra. I wondered who Kyungsoo was and what happened to him. Why Jongin’s face looked so lost and broken as he thought of him, his hands clutching the edges of the worn cardboard so tightly his knuckles had turned white. There was this heavy feeling on my chest, and I didn’t know what it was. I just wanted to know why Jongin would want him, when he already got me by his side. I can feel the contraction coming back so I turned and walked out of the room, Jongin didn’t even notice me as I close his door.  
  


* * *

  
After that, I observed Jongin. I noticed how sometimes, he would get this far-away look whenever he stared at my face, the kind of look you would give if you saw something that reminded you of a precious memory. _A ghost of the past coming to haunt you back down._

Sometimes, he would slip and call me a different name, and then he would ask me if I remembered the oak tree, or the amusement park. I would shake my head no and he would stop midway, as if had said something he shouldn’t have, then his expression would close off and he would turn away, excusing himself.  
  
As I watched him walk away, I wondered if this was because I’m not Kyungsoo. The mere thought of it left something bitter inside my tongue, and the crushing feeling on my chest coming back, suffocating me through my windpipes.

 

* * *

 

There’s something wrong with Jongin today. He came home running, slamming the door and locking it with one hand as he peeked through the peephole. He’s radiating so much nervous energy that I couldn’t help but ask what’s wrong.  
  
When he turned around, he looked feverish. His shirt was drenched with sweat, and with shaky limbs, he crossed the room towards me. He grabbed me by my wrist and I almost flinched away from him; his eyes…they look scared, but there’s also a mad glint in them that made something inside me catch.  
  
“They won’t know. They won’t get it, I won’t let them. It’s mine. You’re mine!” He shouted as he shook me hard, his hand clutching my wrist tightly while his other hand was flipping the latch on my nape open.  
  
I tried to ask him what he was doing, what was wrong, but he wouldn’t listen. His hand was already inside my neck when I managed to break free from his grasp and scramble away from him. He was scaring me— this was not the Jongin I know. But he caught up to me and slammed me against the wall.  
  
“Don’t worry, Kyungsoo. We’ll be together again. I will re-create you, make you better, and next time there won’t be any defect. You will have brown hair, warm smile—” He muttered as he held me still. He pushed out the program chip from my neck and I fell to the ground, my vision darkening at the edges.  
  
The last thing I remember was telling him that I was not Kyungsoo, that I was D.O.

 

* * *

 

 

A young police officer crouches down at the synthetic body staring motionlessly at him from the floor. “This is so creepy,” he muttered as he writes his notes on the investigation. He traced the letters carved on the ivory plating of the android’s neck; **_E.B.O.NY [D.O]_** , and wondered how someone could create something that looks so real.  
  
“Look alive, officer.” He turned and saluted at the chief with a firm, ‘‘Sir!’’  
  
“What’re the findings?” the chief asked as he looked around the abandoned apartment. The younger officer scratched the back of his head, “No signs of human life in the area, sir. Well, except for this android here. According to the notes on the bedroom, this was _Electrical Biosystem Operator, Program N Version Y a.k.a E.B.O.NY, memory file [D. O]_ , a robotic humanoid with a system deliberately calibrated to copy a human’s way of thinking and actually act and function as human. But other than that, nothing. There’s little information about the creation. I think the scientist already fled with all his illegal research.”  
  
“Well, no matter then. We should go,” the chief said as he started heading out to the door. The younger officer stopped him and asked, “What about the android, sir? It’s likely an evidence.”  
  
The chief stares at the heap on the floor, then shook his head and continued to walk out of the room.  
  
“That body’s no longer alive. Without the chip, it’s nothing but a shell.”

 

 

 

 

Sometime later, somewhere far away, a man opened her eyes for the first time and met the eyes of his creator. This time, however, his hair was light and her cheeks were flushed red. And when he smiled, heart-shaped lips curving and bright, he looked alive.  
  
“Hello, _Kyungsoo._ ”


End file.
